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Shaping Public Opinion: Volunteering, Government, and News Reports

Late breaking update! 26 May 2004, from Susan Ellis

Guess what? California legislators are reconsidering their 2001 law restricting volunteers and paid laborers from working together on public projects.  CA Assembly Bill 2690. Assemblywoman (Loni Hancock, D-Berkeley), brought at least a dozen environmental and labor groups together to hash out the compromise that produced the bill which would be retroactive to Jan. 1, 2002.  Read a local newspaper account.  AB 2690 will move to the state Senate Labor Committee if it passes the Assembly. The bill must also win full Senate approval and the governor's signature. 

Submitted on 20 May 2004 by Judie Ashley, Director, Resource Development, The Center for Head Injury Services, St. Louis, MO USA I recently read in the St. Louis Business Journal a story about volunteers. It raised the hairs on my neck. They boasted about having or needing at least 3000 volunteers to run the SPGA Golf Tournament here in July. What angered me is they charge the volunteer $125.00 to be a volunteer. That includes free parking a lunch and a shirt. My question is why do they call them volunteers?

I guess I'm just letting off steam. I place a different value on our volunteers. They do not pay us to volunteer.

Should a 1099 form be given to each person paying to volunteer? After I did the addition I was floored even more.

Submitted on 20 May 2004 by Suellen Carlson, Director of Volunteers, Lutheran Social Services, New York State, USA
Maybe I've become mean and nasty in my old age, but I no longer do someone else's job for them. The judge will have to find another way to punish someone other than punishing me in the process. I don't want to chase anyone, get nasty phone calls from someone who has to get in so many hours by a certain time (usually within the next couple of days). I am not interested in surly teenagers who are only putting in their time (and, whose mother has usually made the first call).

I have volunteers, both young and old, who really want to be here. Young people have a variety of reasons that they have to put in so many hours of volunteer service, but on initial contact, I let them convince me that they are motivated and interested in helping out. The volunteers that are devoting so much of themselves to our facility deserve a manager who is willing to take the time to train and supervise them. Our agency doesn't hire everyone who walks in the door. I treat my volunteers the same way. They are the best. They are dedicated and sincere. They know their job is important and needed, and their work is valued. My commitment is to the residents and the agency, not to the court or school system.

Submitted on 11 May 2004 by Dave Gynn, Volunteer Coordinator - Coleman Professional Services, Kent, Ohio
When a local restaurant closed without warning, trash remained and became a concern to nearby businesses. Legal red tape would have taken months and thousands of dollars to locate the out-of-state owner and force a clean up. A small band of volunteers swooped in with gloves, shovels and a truck. Within 15 minutes, all the trash was gone. I say hurrah for volunteers!!!

Submitted on 7 May 2004 by Hillary Roberts, Pres., Project Linus NJ Inc., USA
Whether youth volunteers are "encouraged" or self motivated, they should be welcomed into the nonprofit sector.

Speaking for our agency, I'd rather take a chance on mandatory requirements. To interview that potential volunteer, assess their availability of time, areas of expertise is part of the energy. I fear what message it sends when we discourage participation. At twelve years of age I was grateful for the opportunity to serve my local community and learned a great deal from leadership.

Further, the nonprofit sector is viewed by the public based on how WE as participants behave. As frustrating as media coverage and public perception may be, why does the sector settle for less?

We shouldn't blame the powers that be....unified goals and definable directives can come from each of us. Wouldn't you agree that the excitement for volunteerism lies in being a part of the next evolution?

Submitted on 7April2004 by Sonya Watson, Winnipeg Child and Family Services, Manitoba, Canada
We have post secondary students in education and social services requiring volunteer credit-hours. The initial interview informs us whether they're volunteering 'to the hours' or not. Placements unfold accordingly i.e. short-term tutoring or task orientation vs. longer-term relationship-building. Many students remain to support youth far beyond the hours and it would be a real loss if we weren't open to this type of volunteer. I'm happy to verify their volunteer hours and provide references as part of the exchange relationship. However, mandated volunteer hours across the board at the high school level is not advisable in my opinion. I guess volunteers' maturity and conscious career decisions come into play here.

Submitted on 6April2004 by Merle Walker, Lake Metroparks, Ohio USA
Let's face it with any articles written by the media there can be confusion. Am I a volunteer director, manager or coordinator? Are volunteers paid or unpaid? Is my organization a private or public agency? If you get my drift this is all confusing. Volunteering is big business. Unlike the 50's and 60's, we now have "business volunteerism," "serve and learn," and yes, "mandated volunteering."

Like anything else, if you don't define who or what you are, others will and you may find yourself out of business as you once knew it.
Mandated "community service" comes to my office in the form of school, church, court, health agencies, civic groups, and youth groups, all looking to meet a requirement, all having a short term life expectancy with my agency and works well when all component parts are in place.

Being able to educate those that impact our volunteer program is key to the success of such mandated services. Communicating with social workers, probation officers, ,judges, counselors, government officials etc. can help alleviate the mixed messages. Volunteerism is about forming relations in the community. Not to debate mandated volunteerism, I realize that mandated volunteering doesn't seem to be going away. So as a volunteer manager I prefer to be the one that directs the way it will be utilized toward the mission of my agency. Whether people call it community service or volunteering I had better be clear.

Submitted 0n 5May2004 by Carole Maddox, Public Relations Director, ECHO, Florida, USA
The majority of volunteers at our organization are committed to our mission and their volunteer efforts double and even triple our ability to provide free services and seeds to the hungry around the world.

However, when high school and college students seek to volunteer to fulfill "community service" hours requirements, our experience has been less than positive. For the most part they have proven unreliable in attendance, interested only in putting in their hours, and require too much training by staff for the return we get in service. Whoever started this had good intentions, but for us, it just doesn't work.

Submitted on 5May2004 by Linda Graff, President and Senior Associate, Linda Graff and Assoc., Inc., Dundas, Ontario.  Canada. 
A year ago my home town newspaper carried this headline:  "Students warned to volunteer - or miss graduation"  Almost 2000 students in a neighbouring region had not completed their 40 hours of mandatory community service and without doing the service they would not graduate.
 
Mandatory service of any sort is not volunteering but is often called that as the above headline proves.  What message are we conveying about volunteering?  When we offer the option of volunteering or jail time to an offender are we not saying, "Which punishment would you like to choose today?"
 
Governments worldwide are seizing volunteering and using it to meet political, social and economic ends.  They most often do so without understanding volunteering, without understanding the implications of their programs, and without consulting those who really know about volunteering.  For example, what bright spark in government decided 40 hours of mandatory service was a good idea for high school students?  The work is supposed to be "meaningful".  By the time the student is interviewed, screened (however much might be necessary for the setting), oriented, trained and placed, how much of the 40 hours is left to do something meaningful?  IN the interim the organization bears the expense of all of the front end work to get the student involved, and the overworked manager of volunteers has to do all of the paper work for the education system ... with no compensation.
 
Governments are tinkering with the DNA of volunteerism, slowly but surely altering it and turning it to meet political ends.  The public notion of what volunteering is and can be shifts, as Susan says.  "Our" team members are rarely at the decision making table when the programs are designed.  Many of our national and provincial/state volunteering organizations and peak bodies receive so much funding from governments, sometimes in the form of fees  to deliver the very programs that have the potential to do harm to volunteering, that their capacity to advocate for the movement is compromised.  Is anyone minding the store?

Submitted on 5May2004 by Rosalie White, Field & Education Services Manager, Connecticut, USA
You wrote an interesting column, as usual. My organization (ARRL), the national organization for Amateur Radio operators, regularly posts Web stories about volunteer work; some of the volunteers are written about by news reporters or thanked by government. Many of these stories are about Amateur Radio emergency communications, i.e., Illinois Amateurs doing tornado recovery efforts (at http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2004/04/22/1/?nc=1), who were thanked by the National Weather Service, Chicago. Or Oklahoma Amateur Radio operators (at http://www.arrl.org/?news_list_off=30) handling storm-related emergency communications, which was reported in the The Daily Ardmoreite. So telling your story *does* work, and we have a senior news editor who makes it happen. - Rosalie White (Amateur Radio call sign K1STO), ARRL

Submitted on 5May2004 by Candace Stewart, Volunteer Coordinator, Long Term Care Ombudsman Program of Ventura County, CA USA
As far as our volunteer program is concerned, we are in a "pick up the slack" period. The Licensing Agencies that license and evaluate the skilled nursing and assisted living facilities in our state are being drastically cut by budget woes -- they are not even meeting their own mandates to visit annually and respond to complaints. That leaves our volunteers with added responsibility - that they willingly take on because they are so special and care so much.

Instead of "Community Service" which does connote someone ducking out of time served for doing something wrong, we should use "Service to the Community", which connotes giving back.

Submitted on 3May2004 by Marjorie Moore, Volunteer Development Coordinator, Radio Information Service, Illinois, USA
"Volunteering: Not just for hardened criminal's on parole anymore!" I think of this "Failed Slogan for Volunteer Programs" every time I read about community service requirements. I think that it is dangerous to the perception of volunteering anytime someone is required to do so in order to live in certain place, graduate, or stay out of prison. I think that gives people the perception that volunteering is something for the under skilled to do because they can't do anything else.

Articles like these discourage people from what I call creative volunteering, or using their specific skills to help an organization. You'll notice that the people being punished like the man who was studying bus lines or the people driving the handicapped, were doing out of the ordinary volunteer activities. They were not stuffing mailings, handing out programs, or some other activity that is traditionally a volunteer role. They thought about what they could do, what would mean something to them and the people they wanted to help and did that. By doing that, they got themselves caught in political agendas. Politicians like to say "Yes! We need volunteering!" and turn around and say "No! Not that!" Its no wonder people get mixed messages about what it means to volunteer.

To really volunteer... to really find the true meaning of volunteering, people have to be motivated from within themselves and find something that really means something to them. That's what volunteering really is.

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